Here are some facts about the mobile economy for market researchers to chew on, culled from Pew Research Center’s most recent report on the economics of digital media. Drawing comparisons between 2011 and 2016, Pew's data show that advertisers have shifted their bets decisively to getting mobile right. Investments in desktop advertising  dropped $5.5 billion over five years, while ads targeted to smartphones rose $45.1 billion. 

Is there a lesson in this for the market researchers whose work serves the marketers who are increasingly all-in on mobile? Should researchers follow marketers' lead and reach consumers where they really are (smartphones) instead of trying to interpret data from the increasingly unrepresentative minority who've stayed put on desktops?  Is it OK to assume that what worked best five years ago still works today? One thing is certain: as soon as you decide to go mobile, you can catch up in a hurry once you've done a little research into which mobile methodology to choose.

Here are some of the key markers reported by Pew and compiled by eMarketer. They show how reality has changed, and where it’s going.

• 2011 U.S. ad spending on Desktop-Laptop, $30.4 billion; on Mobile, $1.6 billion

• 2016 ad spending on Desktop-Laptop, $24.9 billion (-18.1%)

• 2016 ad spending on Mobile, $46.7 billion (+2890%)

• Mobile share of all U.S. advertising: 1% in 2011; 24% in 2016

• Desktop/laptop share of all U.S. advertising: 19.6% in 2011, 12.8% in 2016

Clearly, the smart money has concluded that mobile is where people live. So doesn’t market research need to meet them there, too?  With this in mind, here are a few pointers on how to adjust painlessly to the new research realities of the Smartphone Era.

• First, understand that market researchers have realigned before in the face of changing consumer behavior. That’s how the industry went from telephone to online surveys about 20 years ago.

• If your brand is investing heavily in mobile advertising, do some serious thinking about whether you’ll risk a fundamental misalignment between the marketing and market research functions if you don’t make the shift to mobile.

• Next, get up to speed on the state of the art in mobile research, understanding that not all approaches to mobile are equally advanced or effective. Learn about the categorical difference between the two top approaches: in-app and “mobile optimized.”

• Flurry Analytics has found that mobile users spend 92% of their time using apps to access content and carry out tasks, compared to 8% spent using a browser to connect to the mobile web.

• Because they connect respondents’ smartphones to websites to take online surveys, “mobile optimized” research is aligned with the 8% preference level instead of the 92%. 

• "Mobile optimized" is prey to all the problems of the online space, including poor performance -- the commonplace dropped signals and slow load-ins that alienate panelists and diminish completion rates and data quality. .

For a productive conversation about how the in-app mobile approach can align you with the new consumer reality and address your specific research needs, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

Blog bonus: for a quick and entertaining video introduction to mobile research, click here. 

Here's your Friday roundup of 3 items from the MFour blog to keep you up to speed on mobile.

Let’s Have a Collegial Debate About MR’s Future

How Gen Z Is Killing Online Research

Why Millennials Don’t Feel at Home with Online Surveys

And here's a Friday music video to get you off to a jaunty weekend.

Bloomberg reports that Millennials (ages 18 to 34) own 11% of the owner-occupied housing in the United States – only half the ownership rate Baby Boomers had achieved when they were in their early adulthood.

People over 55 now account for 53% of owners, and Gen X-ers (35-54) make up 36%. The problem for Millennials is that few Boomers are interested in selling, creating a shortage of opportunities to enter the housing market.

The article holds lots of implications for the wider consumer economy. Will the housing industry step up to deliver houses and condos that Millennials can afford to buy, rather than rent?  If not, will Millennials patiently save up to buy whatever becomes available when it becomes available  – perhaps after elderly householders die and the homes they’ve sat on come up for sale at last? Or will significant numbers of Millennials give up aspirations of home ownership and spend what would otherwise have been home equity on other consumer goods and services?

Whatever the answers might be, brands and companies need to have them, and consumer researchers will have a hard time obtaining them if they don’t take to heart what virtually all Millennials’ have in common: an overwhelming attachment to their smartphones. For research, the challenge is to realize this represents a big opportunity if they can get mobile right. Here are a few ways to do it:

• Track Millennial shoppers at the Point of Emotion® with in-store or after-visit geolocation surveys.

• Understand which social advertising messages test well with Millennial consumers, by injecting test ads unobtrusively into the targeted audiences’ news feeds on Facebook and other social media.

• Target Millennials by the apps they use – for example, you could talk to users of the Zillow app for rental housing searchers about their intent to own a home someday, even if they’re looking to rent right now. Are they setting aside money to eventually buy? Or does their American dream not necessarily require owning their own homes?

Why conduct these projects on mobile? Because you’ll be reaching Millennials in their comfort zone, especially if you make sure to go with research that exploits a mobile survey app instead of merely connecting the phone to a survey that’s housed online. About 90% of Millennials use smartphones and spend the vast majority of their time on mobile using apps. Flurry Analytics reports that the average U.S. adult spends more than 4½ hours per day with mobile apps.

If you’ve encountered problems connecting with enough Millennials, or with the right demographic segments within the Millennial generation, chances are you haven’t tried in-app mobile to get in touch.That’s how you’ll find them, because no matter what kind of residence they may have, they're at home inside their mobile apps. For a productive conversation about in-app mobile and how it can meet your specific project needs, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

And for a quick, fun video introduction to in-app mobile research, just click here.

It's easy in any profession to get so immersed in day-to-day demands that you lose track of the basic principles that are your foundations for success. With that in mind, here’s a quick reminder of what's most important about consumer panels. 

• The mission of consumer research is to obtain accurate, quality data from validated human respondents in a timely manner, so that it can be mined for insights that contribute to a reliable, realistic basis for business decisions.

• Consumer research is worthless if it generates inaccurate data.

• Inaccurate – or fraudulently inaccurate -- data is not an inconvenience, but a destructive force that threatens to mislead clients into mistaken conclusions and ineffective or even corrosive decisions.

• Suppliers who are cavalier about fraudulent data don't have their clients’ best interests in mind.

• Researchers who tolerate panel fraud are focused on maintaining a smoothly familiar process instead of trying to respond successfully to sweeping changes. We're at a point where mastering change is crucial to achieving real results for the clients and organizational stakeholders who rely on consumer research for a necessary dose of reality.

Educating yourself about in-app mobile is an important first step in mastering new challenges in the data-acquisition landscape. Changing how you obtain data isn't easy, but it's necessary to upholding the core principles and purposes of market research. In today's consumer insights industry, standing still is not an option. For a productive conversation about fighting data fraud and seizing new solutions for your specific needs, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

Previously:

Mobile 101: Fight Panel Fraud with In-App Mobile (Part One)

Mobile 101: Fight Panel Fraud with In-App Mobile (Part Two)

There’s nothing like a courteous, substantive argument between two market research veterans who are passionate about the industry’s future and how it can move forward and prosper during a time of dizzying change. From these kinds of conversations, only good things can arise.

In that spirit, here’s a summary of one such conversation that took place recently on LinkedIn between Todd Costello, a Senior Solutions Executive for MFour who has long held leadership positions in the Insights Association (the industry’s leading nonprofit professional group), and a consumer insights professional with whom Todd has had a longstanding professional relationship.

You can click here for the full exchange, but here's the quick summary.

As he regularly does, Todd shared a post from the MFour blog with his many LinkedIn connections, as a way of keeping them up to speed on developments in market research overall and in-app mobile approaches in particular.

The blog post that touched off Todd’s exchange was entitled “Why Online Research Is Like a Quarterback Who’s Over the Hill.” It drew an analogy between online research and a great athlete (in this case NFL quarterback Brett Favre) who flourishes for many years but inevitably can’t keep up the same level of performance, forcing his team to make a change. 

Todd’s colleague began by complaining that he’s tired of "'this methodology bad’ vs. ‘our methodology good’ article[s].” He asserted that “every methodology has bias and sampling error. There is nothing fundamentally broken about online research. In fact, it's thriving.”

Todd countered with polite disagreement, touching on some of the key points about consumers’ rapid shift to smartphones and mobile apps – and how that obligates researchers to rethink how to reach them. “Change is always hard but necessary for growth,” he wrote.

Additionally, Todd pointed out some of the specific differences between in-app mobile and online surveys:

• Response rates: 55% for in-app mobile vs. 1-2% for online

• Representation: in-app mobile's essential for reaching Millennials

• Engagement: satisfying in-app mobile performance allows for LOI of 20+ minutes

• Panel fraud: Todd noted that he belongs to five online panels, each under a different identity, and that he receives 200 survey invitations a day, affording multiple opportunities to duplicate his responses (with in-app mobile, each smartphone's unique ID validates and makes duplication impossible)

For an objective point of view, Todd invited his LinkedIn connections to read recent editions of the GreenBook Research Industry Trends Report (GRIT), in which the authors have been emphatic about the industry’s need to confront serious problems with online panels – and have urged getting mobile right as one of the first and most important steps the industry needs to take.

Todd’s skeptical colleague came away from the exchange satisfied that they’d had a meaningful talk: “Good stuff. Thanks for putting some more meat around the bones.”

This is how it should always go. To have a similar productive conversation about how in-app mobile differs from online and “mobile optimized” online, and how the in-app approach can meet your specific research needs, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

And here’s a bonus for any classic rock fans out there – a wonderfully tuneful and idealistic song, whose refrain couldn’t be more appropriate: “Successful conversation will take you very far.”

Who’s your favorite scary kid? Billy Mumy’s classic turn in the “Twilight Zone” episode “It’s a Good Life” gets our vote. Linda Blair’s bravura demon-possession turn in “The Exorcist” bears careful consideration. Damien in “The Omen?” Also a candidate. And those ghostly twin girls in “The Shining” are guaranteed to give you the creeps.

Whether they realize it or not, fear of the young will be coming in waves for online research providers and their clients who depend on people taking surveys on desktop and laptop computers. Gen Z, which makes up 26% of all Americans, is rising fast as a consumer force, and how this youthful horde relates to personal computers should scare online researchers out of their wits.

For sellers and buyers of online sample and technology, Nielsen’s Total Audience Report for the first quarter of 2017 reads like something out of H.P. Lovecraft or Stephen King. The average member of Gen Z – ages 2 to 20 in the Nielsen study – spent 8 minutes a day going online with personal computers. Only 19% of the Z-ers connected to the internet with a PC even once a week. This represents a huge generational chasm, even though older generations also decisively prefer mobile to PCs.

• Millennials and Baby Boomers each averaged 62 minutes a day online via desktops or laptops. For Gen X members, it was 82 minutes a day.

• Conversely, the average Millennial spent 171 minutes a day using a smartphone and 34 minutes using a tablet -- totaling 3 hours and 25 minutes of mobile digital access per day. That’s more than three times the PC-online connectivity Millennials had on personal computers. Only 50% of Millennials used a PC once a week or more to connect online.

• Gen X members spent 156 minutes on smartphones and 46 on tablets, for 3 hours and 22 minutes of average mobile connectivity per day. 42% did not use a PC even once a week to make connections.

• Baby Boomers also are fully on board with mobile: 149 minutes of digital access on smartphones and 36 minutes on tablets, for a total of 3 hours and 5 minutes a day – triple the time spent on personal computers. 44% of Boomers didn't manage a weekly connection via PC. 

• African Americans and Hispanics remain particularly invested in smartphones – 177 minutes a day for African American Millennials and 193 minutes for Hispanics, putting them 3.5% and 12.9%, respectively, above the generational average.

• Comparing Q1 2017 to Q1 2016, mobile usage has skyrocketed across generations. Millennials’ average daily time on mobile was up 52 minutes a day (a 34% increase) and the gains were 61 minutes (43.3%) for Gen X and a whopping 80 minutes (76.2%) for Boomers.

Nielsen didn’t measure Gen Z’s mobile use because of youth privacy restrictions, but you can safely assume that when it comes to mobile, they’re all-in. The oldest members of Gen Z were just 10 when iOS and Android smartphones came out. Most youngsters won’t remember a world without smartphones.

As we said, these are scary times for online research, and it’s only going to get worse. But there’s still plenty of hope. Knowledge and understanding will overcome fear, and you can start reducing your fear factor immediately by learning more about mobile research. For starters, you’ll need information to make an intelligent choice between in-app mobile solutions that are unique to smartphones and tablets, and “mobile optimized” methods that merely shoehorn online surveys onto smaller screens. For a productive, scare-free conversation, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

And for a quick, entertaining video introduction to in-app mobile, just click here.

Here's your Friday roundup of 3 items from the MFour blog to keep you up to speed on mobile.

• Why Online Research Is Yesterday's Hero

• What's the Big Idea? In-App Mobile!

• Key Takeaway from Disney's Big Move: Mobile Apps Rule

And here's a Friday music video to rock your world as you head into your weekend.

With the NFL season almost upon us, we’d like to give online research its due while being realistic about what’s happened to it: today's online is like an old veteran who was once great but can no longer get the job done. And because the game is all about winning, it's time for the team to move on to something better. 

A case in point is former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre. He had an epic career that lasted 20 seasons – including more than 17 straight seasons in which he didn’t miss a game and set an all-time NFL record by playing in 321 consecutive games (playoffs included). No quarterback in pro football history threw the ball more (10,960 attempts) or completed more passes (6,781). Along the way, Favre won three straight Most Valuable Player awards in the 1990s, and quarterbacked the Packers to two Super Bowls, winning one.

Online research also has had its time of glory. For about two decades it was the most prolific survey mode in the consumer data game, and it provided many most-valuable insights. But as was the case with Brett Favre -- and just about every other great athlete -- time and change take their toll. Online research is in its twilight now, its performance and capabilities greatly diminished from its prime. 

The statistics show that Favre hung on one year too many: in 2010, his last season, he threw nearly twice as many interceptions as touchdowns, had the worst quarterback rating of his career (69.9, down from peak years when he was always above 90), and suffered a sprained shoulder and a concussion that kept him out of three games, ending that mighty streak of consecutive games played. Meanwhile, the Packers had moved on, trading Favre to clear the way for Aaron Rodgers, who quickly established himself as a great, Super Bowl-winning quarterback for a new generation.

On today’s market research playing field, you can think of online research as Brett Favre in that stumbling last year. While he continued to be respected for what he'd done, he was no longer a difference-maker who could give his team a solid chance to win.  And so it is with online research as it stands today. Quality completes are harder to come by, projects are being routinely intercepted by fraudulent survey bots, and doubts have set in about online’s ability to deliver a demographically representative consumer panel. Increasingly, we see it resorting to Hail Mary tactics such as routing, river sample, and multi-source panel-blending. The result is compromised data and widespread discontent with project results. 

Meanwhile, the game has moved on to its next dominant player, in-app mobile research. Brands and major market research firms are becoming increasingly aware of what it can accomplish -- and that if you’re in the insights game to win, in-app is the weapon you need. To have a productive conversation about in-app mobile (and, if you like, talk a little football), just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com.

And for an entertaining video introduction to in-app mobile research, just click here.

In any profession or trade, it’s easy to get lost in the weeds of day-to-day demands and lose track of the basic facts and objectives that are the foundation of success. With that in mind, here’s what insights professionals and marketers need to remember about consumer panels. The overarching insight here is that panel fraud and cutting corners to fill quotas will turn survey data into a corrosive force instead of an illuminating one when it comes to business decision-making. Today’s topic is…

Avoiding the Cracks in Online Panel Quality

• Consumers in all demographic groups have gone mobile and favor mobile apps.

• Consequently, online surveys fielded to panelists who use desktops or laptops fail to meet consumers where they are and in the way they’d prefer.

• Because they are trying to reach consumers where they were instead of where they are, online panel providers need to scratch, scramble and use catch-as-catch-can methods to deliver the completes and demographics they’ve promised their clients.

• Consequently, online panel providers increasingly turn to multi-sourcing or river sampling (ad hoc recruitment from the web) to deliver on their contracts. 

• Multi-sourcing opens the door to duplicate responses. It also increases the likelihood of fraud by bots that imitate human respondents. That's because bots are endemic to the online sphere, whether it's ad fraud or consumer survey fraud. 

• Sample providers whose main consideration is cost and convenience instead of reliable data from validated panelists are giving you what you pay for. And it isn't quality, fraud-free data. 

The best defense against panel fraud and compromised data is to educate yourself about in-app mobile research. It's a lot less complicated than trying to get a handle on all the hazards you'll have to account for when you buy online sample. Just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com. And for an entertaining video introduction to in-app mobile, just click here. 

Related:

Mobile 101: Fight Panel Fraud with In-App Mobile (Part One)

Any conversation about mobile research is a good conversation, especially when it emphasizes a core truth like this:  “Excluding people who will only take part [in surveys] via mobile is going to compromise your research – and this effect is likely to increase.”

The quote is from consultant Ray Poynter, a thought leader on survey methodology who has kept track of developments in mobile research over the years. It’s part of an article Poynter posted recently entitled “Major Update on Mobile Market Research.” But the conversation Poynter instigates is incomplete, because it neglects to reckon with in-app mobile surveys that represent the state-of-the-art. More about that in a moment.

Poynter’s article does reflect a thorough understanding of why it’s crucial to get mobile research right: smartphones are indispensable portals to today’s consumers, who overwhelmingly choose to receive and exchange information on their omnipresent, all-consuming phones. Perhaps the most telling statistic comes from the Pew Research Center: 77% of the U.S. public was using smartphones as of late 2016, rising to 92% among younger (18-29) Millennials. Here’s another: Flurry Analytics reports that the average American adult spends five hours a day on mobile devices – including more than 4 ½ hours using mobile apps.

As Poynter emphasizes, it follows, logically, that market research needs to meet today’s mobile consumers where they are, or face the consequences of being increasingly out of touch with what’s really happening in the marketplace. His article then dives into details of how best to adapt online surveys to smartphones.

And this is where his "major update” falls short. There’s an erroneous assumption, hardly unique to Poynter, that there’s just one way forward: trying to reconcile long-established online surveys to smartphones by tweaking designs that work well on personal computers but alienate mobile respondents with poor functionality and display.

There is, in fact, another approach: in-app mobile survey methodology that’s not just incrementally different, but stands categorically apart from online mobile research.  In-app research technology cuts the cord between the smartphone and the internet, allowing surveys to load instantly into the phone, where they can be taken offline. This approach renders everything you’ve heard about “mobile optimization” irrelevant.

No disrespect intended. To repeat: Poynter does everyone a service by emphasizing the fundamental need for insights professionals to get mobile research right. But it’s time to take the conversation a step further by always including the in-app mobile alternative in any discussion. Here, for starters, are three key value points:

• Faster, more fluid performance that keeps respondents engaged, even with longer surveys lasting 20 minutes or more.

• Instant load-ins that store the questionnaire in the app, allowing respondents to take surveys offline, where there’s no risk of dropped connections to the internet, and no vulnerability to survey-taking bots that defraud researchers and distort data by imitating real consumers.

• Multimedia capabilities that are unique to smartphones, harnessed to proprietary location-research technologies such as GeoIntensity^® and GeoNotification^®, which make it possible to survey shoppers in-store or just after they’ve completed a visit, or to test social media ads by injecting them directly and unobtrusively into targeted consumers’ news feeds.

In-app mobile is not an untested technology or an unproven approach. Major brands including PepsiCo and Warner Bros. have embraced it to great effect. So let’s start remembering in-app solutions whenever the conversation turns to how consumer research can take advantage of  the unprecedented opportunities the Smartphone Era presents. For an in-depth conversation right now, just get in touch at solutions@mfour.com. And for a quick, entertaining video overview of in-app mobile, just click here.